Tête de Femme (Jacqueline au chapeau noir)

Picasso's model from the mid-1950s to the end of his life was Jacqueline Roque, whom he met at the Madoura pottery in Vallauris and married in 1961 just before his eightieth birthday. John Richardson has designated this period in the artist's life as l'époque Jacqueline: "It is her solicitude and patience that sustained the artist in the face of declining health and death and enabled him to be more productive than ever before and to go on working into his ninety-second year" (Late Picasso, exh. cat., The Tate Gallery, London, 1988, p. 47).